Nassau County area

Population and density of Nassau County

The Census Bureau estimates that 1,398,939 people lived in Nassau County on July 1, 2025. That ranks #30 of 3,222 county equivalents nationally and #6 of 62 in New York. Since the April 1, 2020 estimates base of 1,395,776, the population has grown by 3,163 (+0.2%), compared with −1% for New York as a whole.

With 284.5 square miles of land, that is 4,916 people per square mile (1,898 per km²), placing Nassau County #20 nationally for density and #6 in New York. The median county equivalent has 47 people per square mile; the New York median is 112. Put another way, there are about 0.13 acres of land per resident.

U.S. Census Bureau, Vintage 2025 population estimates. Estimates are revised each year and are not decennial census counts. Density divides the whole population by the whole county’s land area, so it describes an average, not how settlement is distributed within the county. Population sources and methods.

Cities and towns in Nassau County

Nassau County is divided into 5 cities and towns. In New York, county subdivisions are local governments, and together they cover all of the county’s land and residents.

The most populous is Hempstead town, with 795,734 residents (56.9% of the county), and it is also the largest by land at 118.5 mi². Among those with at least 1,000 residents in 2020, North Hempstead town grew fastest since then (+0.6%).

Population: U.S. Census Bureau Vintage 2025 subcounty estimates, counting only the part of each subdivision inside Nassau County. Land: 2026 Census Gazetteer. How communities are listed.

Metropolitan area

Nassau County is a central county of the New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ Metropolitan Statistical Area, in the Nassau County-Suffolk County, NY metropolitan division. Its 22 county equivalents have 20,112,448 residents on 6,139.7 square miles of land; Nassau County accounts for 4.6% of the land and 7% of the residents. By combined land it ranks #34 of 393 metropolitan areas, and #1 by population. It belongs to the New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT-PA Combined Statistical Area.

ZIP codes

70 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas have land in Nassau County; 69 of them have most of their land inside the county, and the others mainly cover neighboring areas.

11001110031101011020110211102311024110301104011042110501109611501115071150911510115141151611518115201153011542115451154711548115491155011552115531155411556115571155811559115601156111563115651156611568115691157011572115751157611577115791158011581115901159611598117091171011714117321173511753117561175811762117651177111783117911179311797118011180311804

ZIP Code Tabulation Areas are the Census Bureau’s approximations of USPS ZIP Code service areas, from the 2020 Census relationship files. Lighter codes have less than half of their land in this county. Post-office-box and single-address ZIP Codes have no tabulation area.

Counties bordering Nassau County

Nassau County shares a land border with 2 county equivalents. It has more land than 1 of them. The largest neighbor is Suffolk County (910.9 mi²) and the smallest is Queens County (108.7 mi²). Together with its neighbors, Nassau County forms a block of 1,304.2 mi² of land, of which it holds 21.8%.

How big is Nassau County compared with U.S. states?

Nassau County has less land than any of the 50 states. Rhode Island, the smallest state by land area, has 1,033.9 mi², about 3.6 times as much. New York’s county land could hold about 166 areas the size of Nassau County.

Another way to picture it: the same land area would fill a square about 16.9 miles (27.1 km) on each side. Real county shapes are rarely square, so this is a scale reference rather than a width or driving distance.

State figures are the sums of each state’s county-equivalent land measurements in the same Census release, so states and counties are compared on the same basis. Published state totals can differ slightly because of rounding. Compare all states · Counties bigger than entire states.

What stands out about Nassau County?

Nassau County has more land than 389 of the other 3,221 county equivalents in the dataset.

A median is the middle county-equivalent measurement, not the average of the largest and smallest. All three bars use the same linear scale. Very small areas may appear as a thin sliver; the labels retain their values.

Does including water change its rank?

Using land plus water places Nassau County at #2,331 nationally by total area, 502 places closer to the top than its land rank. The water assigned to this geography moves it ahead of some county equivalents with more land.

Its water share is 37.2%, compared with a national county-equivalent median of 1.2% — 36.1 percentage points higher. This describes the statistical geography’s land/water mix, not flood exposure or developable land.

Closest positions in the national land ranking

These entries sit immediately beside Nassau County in the national ranking. They can be in different states and are not necessarily geographic neighbors.

Calculated from the same Census release as the area table. Total-area order uses original ALAND + AWATER; water shares and chart labels use published square miles. Calculation details.